1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a head slider, a head assembly, and a magnetic disk device, in particular, a structure of a head slider for realizing thermally assisted magnetic recording.
2. Description of the Related Art
Recently, as one of technologies for improving a recording density of a magnetic disk device, thermally assisted magnetic recording is proposed. The thermally assisted magnetic recording is a technology of recording data by applying magnetic field and heat to the recording medium. Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2008-10026 discloses a head slider using a laser light source and a near field optical element as means for heating the recording medium.
However, in the conventional head slider described above, the laser light source is disposed between the head slider and a head supporting member, and the near field optical element is disposed on a medium facing surface side. Therefore, it is necessary to form a wave guide for guiding light from the laser light source to the near field optical element in the head slider. As a result, the structure for heating the recording medium becomes inevitably complicated. In addition, because the laser light source is disposed between the head slider and the head supporting member, there is also a problem of heat distortion of the head supporting member due to heating of the laser light source.